What makes a terrorist a terrorist?

Jazz, the source of the "imperialist" nature of Islam isn't all the Koran, but other writings and the life of Mohammed and histories of the religion. "The context of verses" means what? Different branches of Islam deal with the verses differently. Are you just going to dismiss the fundamentalist interpretations?Tell me EXACTLY what kind of evidence you are looking for. I've been going back through old threads on the subject and it appears to me that you won't accept anything for evidence. I'm not going to knock myself out producing all the links and quotes only to be told I didn't do it precisely according to your requirements. So please define EXACTLY what you want evidence for and what sort of evidence is acceptable to you.

isarael became a SELF declaired state on the back of a terrorist conflict with the controlling britsih and local arab s , yes neigbours joined the fight after 1948 , but many combatents only had to open THEIR frountdoors to be inside the new israel and to join the fighting ...what was their land , some one had desided to call israel . .. if you keep reading its clear reverse the situation ... who then is right or wrong .....its called trying to see the whole picture , taking an objective view. thank you for a brilliant example of your logic and view , where you start a paragraph saying its not about right or wrong , and then say who is wrong ...ok who is wrong ..
any one who by action or inaction causes the death of a human being ....
who is guilty .... both sides leaders and their backers , both side combat troops , the world powers for not acting to force both side to stop .... you are so close , but you still fail to see past the propogander of both sides ..joe public in israel and palastine want peace and security and freedom ....ok they dont really want each other as neigbours but lets face it that family 2 doors down with the son playing loud music all hours is worst that having a jew/arab living in the same street , they can live with it ....it is the entreched goverments / leaders on both side that use hatred and religion to drive their view as the "real" situation ..yes the arab side calles for the removal of the state of israel BECAUSE israel will not return the land it now controls , and israel can because it will then not exsist , Israel calles for a end to armed conflict ..but states it can never met the political demands of the arabs .. they are locked in a circle .., err try watching the news .. the wall israel is building , the withdrawl of israel from cetian areas , the statements that other areas will remain indside israel , israel drwawing up iots own boarders , and then walling them off ... claiming then the palastinians have land and can form a state ... all with out negosation or reference to the veiws of the palastinians .. so if the un the usa and europe russia china et al say ok israel go do what ever you think all would be well !!!! what do you base this on ?? how many times has israel gone into lebanon , how many safety zones has it set up over the years .. how many have worked ???
how many terrorist/fredom fighter groups have been defeated by indirect artillry fire and airial bombardment ???
Sorry but no you cant play the jewish card , if the population of israel was anglo saxon , slavic , germanic , irish , natvie america , inca , or what ever the comnflict would be the same .... how hard did the arab s fight the european xian crusader states when they controled basicly the same land .....its not that the people of israel are jewish , its that they are sitting on the land ..and no one said appease the terrorist .. what i said was destroy the terrorist by undermining their base support .. the people , the causes , make the terrorist redundant ...otherwise you remain trapped in the circle of conflict .. with both side killing each other because it is the easiest responce .

First, thanks for admitting in the other thread that I made my point. The fact that Israel has a history of collective punishment against other people is important to understanding how people respond to Israel in recent times, regardless of what historical or theological issues relate to the area in general. I find this highly ironic. Israel was formed by an admittedly imperialist movement called Zionism, which is directly related to a faction of extreme Jewish fundamentalism.The indigenous population was amenable to jews living and working there and had been for a very long time. There were squabbles but nothing huge.Then the Zionist movement, backed by the British gov't (solidified after a terrorist campaign by Zionists against the British territorial occupiers), formed an empire by cutting arbitrary borders to achieve a ruling minority within a portion of the region. This was not an act of coexistence, and was in the face of calls for coexistence by others.It inherently disenfranchized all nonjews inside this new "realm" and outside, cutting off families and property with no regard of its practical impact.If you actually believe in freedom and democracy, then Israel should be anathema to you. It was a fundamentalist racial/religious state imposed by fiat on a diverse population over the will of the majority there.It is no wonder that they responded badly to this, and continue to find it upsetting, especially in light of US propaganda that we are "for" democracy and freedom. What we have shown in practice is that we are for them knuckling under to whatever Israel wants.I am not suggesting that this makes terrorism acceptable as a response. Just that not all anti Israeli actions are terrorist in nature or connected to some fundamentalist Islamic activity. Palestinians in specific (and now the Lebanese) have some very legitimate gripes, some we'd be more than willing to use violence to solve if it happened to us.And on the flipside, Israel is the direct product of a religious fundamentalist movement which used terrorism in its campaign to achieve statehood, and at least on the local level (putting aside the question of state terrorism) continues to engage in terrorist actions against nonIsraelis (and it should be noted they sometimes harm nonjews within Israel).The settler movement in specific contains especially rabid elements, who have even killed Jewish Israeli leaders who have defied their will to expand their god given empire. It was they, and not Palestinians, who commited the first large scale massacre in the region, including suicide attacks and bombings. It was they, and not the Palestinians, who murdered the Israeli PM because a peace agreement had been reached and an end to the violence was in sight.These are the facts Faith. If you do not understand this, then you need to read more history (including recent history). You can even read stuff written by the Zionist leaders themselves like Sharon, Yahu, or the neoconservatives in Washington who advocated an aggresive pro Israeli stance. They discuss their own imperialist plans openly.

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

Holmes, this is an incorrect understanding of "imperialism." I haven't used the word myself, even in relation to Islam, because it's a political word that has to be stretched to apply even there. It doesn't apply at all to Zionism, which is really the exact opposite, a movement to establish a self-contained island or oasis in the midst of the world, as opposed to a movement to possess other lands or even the whole world, which is what imperialism is. Calling their possession of Palestine imperialism is politically motivated rather than accurate. "Empire" indeed. Have you noticed the size of Israel? They wanted their own land. What does "coexistence" have to do with it? You are simply manipulating terms to imply something sinister that had its bad moments but can hardly be fairly so described. They had no designs against anyone else. They obtained the land fairly. There is no reason to think they wouldn't have happily coexisted with their neighbors if the neighbors hadn't been so belligerent. YOu can't just make broad unsupported allegations like this. Nonsense. Again just a wild unsupported assumption. I've read some history of the region myself and your version is just the far-out leftist version. I personally don't see why every government in the world has to be a democracy. Freedom doesn't necessarily require democracy. And I don't see why we have to make every nation a melting pot. There ought to be some room in this world for a diversity of cultures, rather than this determined mixing of everyone into a homogeneous cultural stew. No, a lot of them are leftist rather than Islamicist. They seem to have joined forces. I adamantly disagree. You are blind to the machinations behind the scenes that merely use the political gripes to further their ideological aims. Another wild unsupported accusation. I haven't seen a supported fact in all of that holmes. Nothing but a typical leftist fingerpointing rant. You are misusing that term again. Right now they probably have the firepower to take over the entire Arab world if they wanted. They don't want to. They aren't imperialists. I've read quite a bit on the subject, just no doubt not the same sources you have read.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

The truth about Islamic terrorism is everywhere but denied, actually not just denied but denounced in purple prose, and those who try to show that truth are vilified in the most extreme terms as evil people, and the truth itself called ugly and vicious, and this is the attitude of most of you here at EvC. Victor Davis Hanson shows that this attitude is like the pre-Hitler world when appeasement and denial and blind misinterpretation of the facts were also rampant. Actually this attitude now is worse than that then because of the nearly unbelievable aggressive self-righteousness in condemning the truthtellers.I suppose this is a supernatural blindness and there is no hope of waking any of you up, but here's another attempt just for the record. Victor Davis Hanson
The Brink of Madness

I'm not going to get into a semantics argument with you. Members of the zionist movement and its supporters have called it an empire, which denotes an imperialist attitude. If you want to call it something else then fine, I'm not stuck on the term imperialism. But the facts on the ground remain.There is about 0 difference between the rabid zionist movements and the rabid Islamic movements... except that zionists want to impose their will on an area where they were not and are not the practical majority population.And the size of Israel is not the question. Its about activities, not the size of the region covered which determines "imperialist" agendas.On the flipside you keep calling me a leftist, and using leftist descriptions, which is a total misuse of that terminology. I am NOT a leftist. I am quite conservative on some issues, most especially the ones that impact this particular issue. Well, I personally agree with that statement, with the exception that I want to live in a nation that is a democratic republic, and will work to support that form of gov't for wherever I am living. I do believe that it is one of the more practical forms of gov't.But what does that have to do with my point? I said that Israel is NOT a true democracy and so people in the region are upset because the US claims to be advancing that in the region by aiding Israel over their own interests. Heck, we are now down to having invaded Iraq to spread freedom and democracy and use Israel as the example of the "sole democracy" in the region. Its blatant hypocrisy and you didn't deal with that point.Contrary to democratic ideals, Israel denied peaceful majority rule in order to form the nation and acquire new lands to stretch its borders. Oh wait, that must be one of my unfounded assertions.You know for all of your claims to have read so much, and statements about how I only make unsupported claims, you have yet to cite ONE source for any of your statements. In fact, when challenged on a single claim of mine in the other thread I managed to prove to you quite sufficiently that I did have evidence to back it, which means YOU WERE WRONG. You don't think I have plenty to support my claims here?But I'm not going to make it that easy. I'm throwing the gauntlet to you first.I have claimed that the state of Israel was imposed on an indigenous population that vastly outnumbered Jews residing there. The indigenous population was not averse to living with jews or forming a singular nation with jews. It was zionists who demanded that a nation be formed to their demands with them alone as its controllers, and at times engaged in terrorist actions to achieve that end.Forming Israel involved the intentional parsing of land so that Jews would have a contiguous area where they were a voting majority that would be maintained as such.This parsing disenfranchised the local populations by splitting families and property with no respect for their practical welfare. Non jews inside Israel were forced into the position of voting minority in lands they in reality outnumbered jews. Those outside Israel lost ability to move and conduct family/business as they had for centuries and were forced to choose between a split land with little power, or statelessness.Afterward more land has been grabbed by settler movements, members of which have harmed Palestinians and Israelis alike, whatever is needed to grow Israel to what they view as its proper borders. This included murdering an Israeli PM they viewed as a traitor because he had signed peace accords which looked like they were going to work, but cost them land they wanted to expand into.You dissed all of the above claims as unsupported finger waving leftist propaganda. YOU put your money where your mouth is! Show your sources, with quotes, that refute these claims, or rather support your own version of history and politics of Israel. Given that I was challenging your claims to start with that would make sense anyway.I am particularly disturbed that you are trying to pass off the assination of the Israeli PM by hardcore zionists as being some flaky assertion of mine. Its pretty damn well documented, including by Israelis. In fact it was mentioned by Israelis within the last couple years when Sharon came under the same threat for ceding territory. 1) They don't have that kind of firepower. They can't invade small portions of Lebanon without an influx of more missiles from the US. I mean in case you didn't hear, while all of this is going on we are continuing to arm the Israelis so they can continue their attacks.Heck, Israel can't maintain its status as occupier of the Palestinian territories without US support. It has long been standing on the shoulders of the US giant.2) They don't have the people power for such an agenda. At least the British could claim some sort of large population at home as well as reason for influence (trade and naval power which could injure trade of others). That is they could exert influence by themselves and had reason to expand. Israel has enough problems trying to maintain a majority population within its ever increasing borders, as small as they are, and has NOTHING to offer the region such that they could exert some sort of "charismatic" influence.I can't believe you are trying to argue that because they haven't wiped out their neighbors they must have benign intentions. They have been oppressing the indigenous population from the inception of Israel and have taken territories and assets (like water) according to their own desires, over the practical welfare of everyone else. Prove it. You and Buz have both been saying things which have NO resemblance to what I have learned about that region, and so far you both keep getting proven wrong. Time for you to put up or shut up on the above facts.I should say your claim to having read a bit stands in stark contrast to your recent admission you haven't researched much detail about Israel, in order to excuse your last mistake.

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

or, you know, an entire race of people are vilified as vermin and a threat to ordered society.granted, the claim is a little more valid with arabs -- as there are arabs that blow things up (whereas the jews were relatively harmless) -- but racism is racism. perhaps it's you who needs to wake up for a change. islamic fundamentalism is dangerous because fundamentalism is dangerous. religion is being used as a tool to manipulate people. islam itself is not the problem. the qu'ran is not the problem (any more than the bible is the problem with some of the crazier sects of orthodox jews, and the fundamentalist christians like yourself). it's the disconnection from an educated reading of the text, and the simplistic mindset of "it means what the sheikh/pastor/rabbi told me it means. if i understand it any other way, i must be wrong or perhaps thinking too much."it's far too standard now for the christian fundamentalists to spread hate and lies about islam in general, not just the fundies over there. how is this different from jew-blame? it's still anti-semitism. hate hate hate. how soon will we see christian fundamentalists turn into their islamic enemies, and resort the same extreme measures?for someone living in such a glass house, maybe you shouldn't throw stones.

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Terrorism is worldwide. That's the first fact. It is not limited to Islamic fundamentalists. That is the second. It is not capable of toppling the US or taking it over. That is the third.There is a very real danger posed by certain Islamic extremists at this time. But there are still other threats in this world, and indeed much greater ones. NK and China pose significant security issues and they have little to do with terrorism or Islam.On the home front I face more challenges to my person from Xian fundamentalists peaceful or not, than Islamic terrorists.The problem is that people like you seem not to be able to put the threat into realistic terms, and spread it out to cover all of Islam, rather than specific portions where the real threat comes from. Uhhhhh... I haven't given shit to any Islamic terrorist. The only one asking for appeasement and getting it is the Bush administration, usually by convincing the voting public through blind misinterpretation of facts.Who has gained real power over the last 6 years? The presidency. Who has taken away freedoms long held as sacred to conservatives? The President.Sorry but you have the wrong analogy, with the exception that Hitler did use fear of other people (in this case Jews and Poles and...) to convince a gullible german public they needed to give him as much power as it took to protect them.By the way, post 201 is also for you and calls on you to actually provide evidence you have factual evidence for your position.

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holmes {in temp decloak from lurker mode}
"What a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away." (D.Bros)

Sad. They call it racism to show the truth about Islam. Sad. They pretend the worldwide terrorism is not Islamic because that might be racist. Hang the truth. Sad.Oh and since my post is merely being buried by all this irrelevant caviling, let me suggest that it be read again: Message 200Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

What a bunch of utterly mindless formulaic moral equivalence.The piece by Hanson shows the terrible truth that it is the Jews who are again being demonized by the world, in the rush to excuse the real villains in the worldwide drama, just as happened in the years leading up to Hitler's reich. Diabolically ironic that they are being defended as if they were the victims when as usual it's the Jews.Since I hope everyone will read Hanson's piece, here's the post again: Message 200Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Even though at this very minute 20-30,000 Muslims refugees are trying to survive Tamil Tigers fight for Independance from the Sri Lankan governement. In this case the terrorist are not Muslim, the fight is not about Ideology or Islam against the West. There is no pretense involved. Terrorism is NOT just an Islamic phenomenon. To pretend that it is is to ignore reality in favor of some personal dogma. Thousands of Muslims flee fierce fighting in Sri Lanka

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

It doesn't have to be the ONLY terrorism in the world to be the MAJORITY terrorism, and all rooted in one ideological cause.

Sad. One pretends to have never heard of a non-Islamic terrorist--not the Shining Path in Peru, not the UAC or the National Liberation Army in Colombia, not the IRA, not the Japanese Red Army, not the KKK or other white supremacists in the U.S.--just to avoid being confronted as a racist. The U.S. State Deparment has listed dozens of terrorist organizations that could threaten the U.S., and many of them are not Islamic. Sad.Technology and globalization have fueled terrorism. Technology puts unprecedented destructive power in the hands of small groups and individuals; globalization puts distant targets within easy reach. Resisting the will of superpowers is possible as never before, as is the settling of historical scores.People fight with what they have. In Nam, the little kid you handed chocolate one day could hand you an unpinned grenade the next. We condemned their way of fighting, too, but we were the folks projecting power thousands of miles from our home, and soon we were throwing uncooperative prisoners from helicopters and stuffing them into tiger cages, or sending death squads into their villages to assasinate suspect peasants.We thought we could bomb and burn them into submission, too, but it didn't work. I suppose if the world had not constrained us, we could have killed them all.Then we'd be safe from everyone but ourselves.

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Did you read the Hanson piece? Message 200 Did you notice his points about the many incidents of Koran inspired terrorism? I guess you just can't bring yourself to believe it. Anyawy, you're just another voice in the current madness, supporting the imperialist aggressors who are vilifying the Jews.

I believe you said: I showed you an example of terrorism that is NOT Islamic and in fact where Muslims are the victims. The majority of Lebanese that are being bombed are not terrorists. The majority of Palestinians that are being shelled are not terrorists. The Basque Separation movement is not Islamic. Most of the terrorism in the Middle East is not ideological, but political.Terrorism is NOT just some Islamic phenomenon, and it is NOT just about religion. To pretend it is is to ignore reality in favor of some personal dogma.Egypt has treaties with Israel. Egypt is a Muslim nation.Jordan has treaties with Israel. Jordan is a Muslim nation.It is NOT ideological.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion